Following a three-week hiatus since Tommy Fleetwood’s win at the Tour Championship, the PGA Tour resumes with the first of the FedEx Cup Fall events, the Procore Championship.
It’s not the only big tournament in men’s golf this week, though. On the other side of the Atlantic, at Wentworth in Surrey, England, is the DP World Tour’s flagship event, the BMW PGA Championship.
This year, there is added interest in both tournaments as each will serve as preparation for players involved in the Ryder Cup, which gets underway at Bethpage Black on September 26th, but which tournament has the stronger field?
In total, 10 of the US Ryder Cup team will be teeing it up at the Procore Championship.
Among them is long-term leader of the world rankings, Scottie Scheffler, who will be joined by fellow US Ryder Cup stars Sam Burns, Patrick Cantlay, Harris English, Ben Griffin, Russell Henley, Collin Morikawa, JJ Spaun, Justin Thomas and Cameron Young.
That means that only Xander Schauffele and LIV Golfer Bryson DeChambeau from the team will not be appearing at the tournament.
A similar tactic is being deployed by European team captain Luke Donald, with 11 of his 12 Ryder Cup stars preparing to compete at Wentworth and only Sepp Straka missing out.
That means we’ll see Rory McIlroy, fresh from his thrilling win at the Irish Open, along with Ludvig Aberg, Matt Fitzpatrick, Fleetwood, Tyrrell Hatton, Rasmus Hojgaard, Viktor Hovland, Shane Lowry, Robert MacIntyre, Jon Rahm and Justin Rose compete.
There’s no doubt both events benefit significantly from their proximity to the Ryder Cup given the quality of players using the tournaments to prepare for the match. As a result, both have a stronger field than usual.
That’s reflected in the field rating for each event, a metric based on the total performance points contributed by all players, calculated from their Strokes Gained World Rating, over the past two years of strokeplay rounds.
The Procore Championship’s field rating is 280.63673, up from 211.98264 a year ago. While that leap is impressive, the BMW PGA Championship has the stronger field with a rating of 292.12093, up from 197.57772 in 2024.
Of course, it’s not just those involved in the Ryder Cup who bring quality to each field.
For example, the Procore Championship also boasts players such as PGA Tour winners Maverick McNealy, Akshay Bhatia, Sahith Theegala and Tom Kim.
Meanwhile, the BMW PGA Championship field will feature defending champion Billy Horschel, making his first appearance since undergoing hip surgery, as well as the likes of Adam Scott and Hideki Matsuyama.
Other big names heading to Wentworth include Corey Conners, Si Woo Kim and 2023 champion Ryan Fox, while adding to the star quality are big-name LIV Golfers including Brooks Koepka, Patrick Reed and Thomas Pieters.
While each tournament undoubtedly features a high-class field with some of the game’s biggest names, it is nevertheless one of the rare occasions where, per the all-important field rating, the DP World Tour event outshines the PGA Tour event.
As a result, more world ranking points are also projected to be awarded to the winner of the BMW PGA Championship, with over 50 going to the player who lifts the trophy and just over 48 heading to the Procore Championship victor.
